Something New

by Amanda Abram

  Reading it had made me feel queasy, and recalling it now was causing my stomach to churn.

  “We had fun,” I replied nonchalantly. “We braided each other’s hair.”

  Elijah snorted. “Is that all girls do when they hang out together? Braid each other’s hair?”

  “Yes,” I said with a roll of my eyes. “It’s literally the only thing we ever do.”

  We shared a chuckle and then engaged in small talk for the rest of the trip. A few minutes later, we pulled into the school parking lot and parked next to Dylan’s car.

  Dylan was leaning against the back of it, staring down at his phone, scrolling. When we exited the vehicle, he glanced up at us.

  “Morning, Elijah. Morning, sweet pea.” He winked and flashed me a lopsided grin.

  “You know you two aren’t actually married,” Elijah said, punching him in the shoulder. “You don’t need to keep giving her cute nicknames.”

  “Yes, I do, because it annoys her. It’s my obligation as her pretend husband to annoy her. Were those instructions not included in your packet?”

  Elijah rolled his eyes. “I’ve gotta go talk to someone before homeroom.” He leaned in and gave me a quick peck on the lips. “See you two later.”

  Dylan and I both nodded as he took off, and I couldn’t help but wonder who it was he had to go talk to.

  “Looks like it’s just you and me, snookums,” Dylan said, returning his attention back to his phone.

  “Oh joy.” I scanned the lot looking for Lauren’s car. “By the way, you’re invited to my house for dinner tonight.”

  His head snapped in my direction. “I’m what?”

  “Invited to my house for dinner. Tonight. My mom wants to cook for you, since you’re my husband now and all. She said you should come over after school to work on our project and then stay for dinner.” I paused. “But you don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

  A small smile tugged at his lips. “Oh, I’m accepting this invitation. Elijah says your mom’s a great cook.”

  Elijah thought everyone was a great cook. He was a seventeen-year-old boy with a bottomless pit for a stomach. He inhaled food so quickly he probably couldn’t taste it anyway.

  “Okay. I guess it’s a date then,” I took out my own phone and texted my mom to let her know we were on for tonight. She responded with a series of smiley emoticons.

  “Hey there, klepto,” said a sweet voice next to me before a hand clamped down on my shoulder.

  I turned my head to see Lauren had arrived, and she was smirking at me like she had dirt on me or something. “Hi,” I said cautiously.

  “Good morning, Laurie,” Dylan said blandly. He liked to call Lauren “Laurie” because he knew how much she hated it.

  She ignored him and instead stepped in front of me and leaned in so close our noses were almost touching.

  “Funny story,” she said. “After you left my house last night, I noticed my issue of Cosmo was missing. I looked for it everywhere. Do you have any idea what might have happened to it?”

  My eyes darted left and right to avoid her accusing gaze. “I have no idea.”

  “BS!” She took a step back but thrust a finger in my face. “You stole it so you could read that article, didn’t you?”

  That caught Dylan’s attention. “What article?”

  “Cassie, I’m not mad you stole it,” Lauren said, ignoring Dylan’s question. “I think it’s great, because it means you agree with what I said to you last night.”

  “What did she say to you last night?” Dylan asked me.

  “That’s not what it means,” I said to Lauren, my face suddenly feeling hot. “I was just curious, that’s all.” I unzipped my backpack and pulled out the magazine. “Here, you can have it back.”

  Before Lauren could take it, Dylan snatched it out of my hands. “What article?”

  “Give it back!” I exclaimed, grabbing for it.

  He jerked it away from me and, holding it high up so I couldn’t reach it, began furiously flipping through it in search of the article we were talking about.

  Unfortunately, I’d placed a scrap piece of paper at the page of the article as a bookmark, and when he flipped to it and the paper fell out, he knew he’d found the right one.

  “The Perfect Plan to Please Your Man,” he read aloud, and I wanted to die. He cocked an eyebrow at me. “Really, Briggs?”

  I covered my face with one of my hands and groaned as Lauren began to giggle. At times like this, I wondered why she was my best friend. She should have been mortified for me. Instead, she thought this was funny.

  “Is Elijah getting lucky tonight?” Dylan teased, wiggling his eyebrows.

  “I’m spending tonight with you,” I reminded him.

  His eyes widened with amusement. “Am I getting lucky tonight?”

  I gave him a good shove, pushing him into his car, and took the magazine away from him.

  He and Lauren shared a hearty laugh at my expense as I stalked off toward the building.

  “Oh, come on, Cass,” Dylan said, catching up to me quickly. He threw an arm around my shoulders as we walked. “No need to be shy. We’re all adults here.”

  “None of us are adults,” Lauren corrected him. “And Cassie’s not even seventeen yet like the rest of us.”

  It was true. I was the only one in my circle of friends who was still sixteen; I wasn’t going to be seventeen for another four months.

  “Well, either way, there’s nothing to be ashamed of,” Dylan said, giving me a squeeze.

  “Except for the fact you’re a thief.” Lauren ripped the magazine out of my hands. “There was a quiz in here I wanted to take last night.”

  Dylan snorted. “Why are girls so obsessed with Cosmo?”

  “It’s our bible,” Lauren replied. “It teaches us everything we need to know about womanhood.”

  He smirked. “So, is ‘The Perfect Plan to Please Your Man’ out of The Old Testament Cosmo or The New Testament Cosmo?”

  Lauren glared at him. “Why are you still walking with us?”

  “Why are you?” he shot back. “In case you forgot, I was talking to Cass first before you interrupted us.”

  “Cassie’s my best friend. You’re just her pretend husband for a school project.”

  Putting on a fake hurt expression, Dylan said to me, “Is this true? Is that all I am to you?”

  I shook my head. “No. You’re also my boyfriend’s obnoxious best friend.”

  He clutched the center of his chest where his heart was. “You’re killing me, Briggs.”

  “If only we could be so lucky,” Lauren muttered. She stuck her tongue out at him before the sight of her cheerleading friends huddled together near the school’s entrance caught her attention.

  “Hmm,” she said. “I should go see what’s going on with the girls. See you guys later!”

  She waved and took off.

  Dylan and I continued the rest of our trek in silence until we walked through the front doors of the school.

  “So, hey,” he said. “Since I’m coming over to your house after school, you want to just hitch a ride with me instead of with Elijah?”

  I hadn’t even told Elijah yet about the possibility of Dylan coming over for dinner. Would he think that was weird? Because it was kind of weird. Maybe I’d invite Elijah too. I’m sure my mom wouldn’t mind having an extra mouth to feed. After all, her motto was usually, “the more, the merrier.”

  Maybe he could even hang out with us until dinner. It’s not like Dylan and I had to work on our project.

  “I’ll let you know later. I’m going to talk to Elijah about it.”

  “Talk to me about what?”

  I turned around to see Elijah had snuck up behind us, and he was glancing curiously between me and Dylan.

  “Dylan’s coming over to my house after school to work on our project,” I explained. “Also, my mom told me to invite him for dinner. I think she wants to get to know her pretend son-in-law.”
<
br />   I expected Elijah to look mildly amused at that, but he didn’t. Instead, he just stared at me blankly. “Oh. Cool.”

  There was something in the tone of his voice that made me believe it wasn’t cool, so I quickly added, “Would you like to join us?”

  His eyes shot over to Dylan for a split second before returning to me. “Nah. I wouldn’t want to impose on a family dinner.” The corners of his mouth turned upward in the smallest of smiles. “Besides, I have some stuff I need to do after school anyway.”

  I smiled back. “Okay. Well, I’ll get a ride home from Dylan then.”

  Elijah’s mouth formed a thin line as he nodded. “Yeah, okay.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “Are you sure it’s okay?”

  “Sure. Why wouldn’t it be?” He grabbed my waist and pulled me against him. Leaning down, he pressed his lips against mine in a firm, almost possessive kiss.

  This wasn’t like him. Elijah wasn’t huge on public displays of affection. Especially at school, and especially because of school rules. But I guess he figured since the school day hadn’t officially started yet, he could get away with it.

  I heard a few hoots and whistles from kids nearby as I kissed him back. I also wasn’t a fan of PDAs, but nowadays, if Elijah wanted to kiss me, I didn’t care where, when, or why. I was going to kiss him back.

  When we finally pulled apart, my face was on fire and my heart was racing.

  “You’re blushing,” he said with a smile. He seemed happier now.

  “Everyone just saw us kiss.”

  “Good.” He grinned and tucked a strand of my hair behind my ear. “I’m gonna head to homeroom. See you in class.” He gave me a quick kiss on the top of my head before walking off.

  Once I finally regained my composure, I turned back around to confirm to Dylan he’d be giving me a ride home, but he was nowhere in sight.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Today’s Life Economics assignment was to come up with a food budget and plan our meals for a week. Mrs. Andrews said we could just research online to estimate the cost of the food, but Dylan was having none of that. So, instead of going straight to my house after school, he brought me to a real grocery store to pick out pretend groceries, just like he’d brought me to a real car dealership to pick out a pretend car.

  The guy was taking these assignments way too seriously.

  After a few disagreements over what our weekly menu was going to be (he wanted lots of ramen, I wanted salads), we finally compromised and came up with a decent list of food that fell within our budget, and a while later, we were sitting on the couch in my living room, putting together an extensive menu while my mother was slaving away in the kitchen.

  “You know, I’m starting to feel sorry for our parents,” I said while filling out fields in a spreadsheet. “I had no idea how much work it was to just figure out dinners for the week.”

  “Maybe for your parents it’s a lot of work. My parents don’t plan out any meals. My dad rarely comes home for dinner anymore, and my mom’s idea of dinner nowadays usually just consists of wine.”

  I glanced over at him. “Nobody ever cooks for you?”

  He laughed as if that was the funniest thing he’d heard all day. “Are you kidding me? In their minds, I’m old enough to fend for myself.”

  I frowned. No wonder he often called up Elijah and asked if he wanted to grab a bite to eat with him. It would also explain why he was desperate enough to ask me to the other day.

  My dinner invitation for tonight must have been music to his ears. A homecooked meal—something I had always taken for granted until just about thirty seconds ago.

  “Well, you’re in for a real treat tonight,” I said cheerfully, trying not to let on that I suddenly felt sorry for him. “You’re a first-time guest, so my mom’s going to go all out to impress you.”

  “She could spread peanut butter on a slice of bread, and I’ll be impressed,” he joked.

  I chuckled and went back to the spreadsheet. I was about to run an idea by him regarding Friday night’s dinner when out of the blue, he said, “Hey Cass, can I ask you a personal question?”

  I glanced sideways at him. “If I say no, are you still going to ask it?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then ask away.”

  There was a moment of hesitation before he spoke. “Why did you have that Cosmo article bookmarked? You know, the one about how to please your man.”

  I felt a wave of heat rise to my cheeks. I was hoping he’d forgotten all about that, but I should have known better. He had been way too amused by it to let me live it down anytime soon. “Why do you want to know?”

  Dylan studied me for a moment before setting his laptop on the coffee table and turning so we were face-to-face. “Are you thinking of putting out for Elijah?”

  My jaw dropped as I smacked his arm. “That’s a real romantic way of saying it, Dylan.”

  He was smiling, and his eyes were sparkling with amusement, but at the same time, there was something serious in the way he was looking at me. Like this conversation wasn’t about giving me a hard time.

  It was about warning me.

  Swallowing hard, I asked, “Why are you suddenly so interested in what I plan to do with Elijah?”

  His smile faded. “I know that ever since our project began, and Elijah was partnered with Hannah, you’ve been concerned that he might leave you for her. Like he’ll realize he’s still in love with her or something.”

  My blood began to run cold as he continued. “Look, I’ll be straight with you: I know you and Elijah haven’t gone there yet, and I wouldn’t want you to go and follow everything in that article just because you think it would keep him around. I wouldn’t want you to do something you might end up regretting.”

  My breathing became shallow. “Dylan, do you know something I don’t?”

  Had Elijah confided something in him? That maybe he still had feelings for Hannah? That he was thinking of breaking up with me?

  Dylan’s eyes snapped back up to me and widened as he saw what must have been a look of sheer panic on my face. “No. That’s not what this is about at all. I was just…”

  His voice trailed off as he struggled to find the right thing to say. Luckily for him, my mom chose that moment to poke her head in the living room.

  “You kids doing okay in here?”

  When I didn’t reply, didn’t even glance in her direction, Dylan cleared his throat and answered for me.

  “We’re doing great, Mrs. Briggs. By the way, whatever you’re cooking in there smells delicious.”

  “Thank you,” Mom gushed. “Would you like to come try a sample?”

  “I would love to,” he said, sounding relieved at the distraction she had just provided him with. Jumping up from the couch, he followed her to the kitchen, leaving me alone to wallow in self-pity.

  Dylan could claim all he wanted to that he didn’t know something but that didn’t make it true. He and Elijah told each other everything. If Elijah was having doubts about his relationship with me, or having romantic thoughts about Hannah, Dylan would be the first to know.

  Then again, maybe Dylan was just being a nosy jackass. Maybe he just wanted to give me a hard time about the fact I hadn’t had sex with Elijah yet.

  But he hadn’t.

  In fact, he was trying to encourage me not to.

  A few minutes later, Dylan returned to the living room. “Man, your mom’s a good cook.” He dropped down onto the couch next to me and grabbed my laptop off my lap. “Okay, how’s our menu coming along?”

  He was pretending our conversation never took place. He must have loved my mom for interrupting when she did.

  I wanted to bring the subject back up, but I knew I would get nowhere with him. So instead, I pushed all the bad thoughts out of my head and concentrated on our project.

  We were just finishing everything up when Caitlyn entered the room.

  “Hey, Cassie, who’s your friend?” she asked, sizing Dylan up from head to
toe.

  “I’m Dylan,” he replied. Leaning forward, he extended his hand to her.

  She eagerly shook it and flashed him a wide grin. “I’m Caitlyn. With a C.”

  Dylan smiled warmly. “Nice to meet you, Caitlyn with a C. You must be Cassie’s sister.”

  “Unfortunately, yeah.”

  I shot her a glare, but she didn’t even notice. She was too busy blushing at Dylan.

  “Are you staying for dinner?” she asked him.

  “I sure am.”

  “Awesome,” Caitlyn said with a grin before heading into the kitchen.

  “She seems like a cool kid,” Dylan said with a smirk.

  “Don’t let her fool you.” I shut my laptop and set it on the coffee table. “There. Another assignment down.”

  “We’re killing it.”

  “Yeah, we are,” I said as we high-fived.

  “So, are you going to Tiana’s party Friday night?” Dylan asked.

  I shook my head. “Nope. Can’t. I’m working.”

  “All night?”

  “Not all night. Just until eleven. But by that time, it’ll be pointless to go, since my curfew’s at midnight anyway.”

  “That’s too bad. It’s going to be a good one.”

  Every party was considered “a good one” to anyone who went. There was going to be nothing different about this party than any other party I’d been to with Elijah in the last ten months, so I wasn’t bummed at all about not being able to go. The only thing I was going to miss out on was making out with Elijah in a dark corner somewhere, but I didn’t need to be at a party to do that.

  “Okay, kids,” Mom called out from the kitchen. “Dinner’s ready!”

  Dylan and I put our stuff away and made our way to the dining room, where there was a feast awaiting us on the table.

  I was right; Mom had gone all out for this dinner. She’d even dressed up the table with her finest tablecloth and added a couple of her handmade centerpieces in the middle. Crafting centerpieces was a hobby of Mom’s, all part of her obsession with hosting dinner parties. She saved some of them to use for occasions like this, while others she would sell online for a surprisingly decent amount of money.